Aran - The land of strife

Hrm. You should be able to download another Version of IRC. If not or if you use any other chat program (AIM, MSN, ICQ, Yahoo, etc)there is Trillian.
http://www.ceruleanstudios.com/

It lumps them all together, so if you have friends/family that use different chat programs you don't have to start up each one for them to talk to them. OR if your GIRLFRIEND must use these programs to talk to her family no matter how much you HATE them it can bundle them up pretty good.

Don't blame me though if your wife/girlfriend puts all her little friends/family to talk for hours on your gaming machine or server machine.